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Marine Life
Birds page 2
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 About the Artist A resident of Alaska for over 30 years, Ellen was trained at the University of Alaska - Fairbanks and at the Revere Academy of Jewelry Arts in San Francisco, California. She lived for 16 years in the small coastal town of Homer, Alaska along beautiful Kachemak Bay. She now resides in Green Valley, Arizona. Ellen began making jewelry in 1974, having taken a class in jewelry fabrication where she was introduced to the method of lost wax casting. Lost Wax Casting First, an original is carved from various hard waxes or built up with heat using soft waxes. When the desired piece is achieved, it is sprued to a rubber base attached to a steel cylinder (flask) and filled with plaster. The flask is placed in a kiln and the temperature gradually raised to 1350°F, burning out the wax model and leaving the cavity to be filled with the desired metal. The molten gold or silver is thrown into the plaster cavity in the flask by a centrifugal force. The next step is to clean up the casting and polish the finished piece. The lost wax technique is a very ancient one and modern tools now make the job much less time consuming. The process between conception of a design idea and its final polish may take several days, but the time between a perishable model (while still in wax) and its transformation into glowing solid metal takes only a few seconds. That quick transformation is one of the exciting aspects of this method of making jewelry.  "I'm always relieved and slightly apprehensive
when my model is embedded in plaster, no
longer available to me for last minute changes.
I know that anything can happen between the
burn-out and the removal of what I hope
will be a perfect cast. Shaking the metal
piece out after casting is almost like opening
a gift - even though I know what should be
there, I'm anxious to see what did happen."Ellen feels that the lost wax method allows the most versatility in design. Almost any conceivable design can be built in wax, cast, and transformed into durable, lustrous gold or silver in seconds. Designs By Ellen  Besides producing a line of pendants, earrings, and charms seen here, Ellen custom designs and creates contemporary rings and specialty items with or without precious stones. She believes most people find special enjoyment of and attraction to wearable metals…. "I just love the feel of gold." Page through the following "catalog" (using the menu to the left) and choose items you wish to order. To order an item, click on 'Order'. The images shown in the catalog are not actual size. The actual size of each jewelry piece is presented textually on the catalogue pages. |
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